


tomorrow will be kinder

by thewindraiser



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Adoption, Angst, Disabled Character, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pediatrician Suga
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-21
Updated: 2016-03-21
Packaged: 2018-05-28 06:19:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6318058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewindraiser/pseuds/thewindraiser
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Suga knows it as soon as he holds her in his arms, this is his daughter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	tomorrow will be kinder

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Crollalanza](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crollalanza/gifts).



March 21st, 2033

 

The funny thing about life is that you don’t really know where you’re going until you’ve already arrived. And if you do know, if you have a plan, it’s pretty much guaranteed things are not going to go your way. This is not always a bad thing, as far as he’s concerned Suga always found it weirdly comforting. The unpredictability.

Game plays and players in the past, patients and illnesses now. He observes it all, stores the informations and then analyzes. Acts consequently. It was his role then in Karasuno, now it’s his job, it’s his life. But that one variable, the unexpected chromosome, an earthshaking emotion, the surprising actions and consequent reactions that make up a life, everything that truly reveals the complexity of people, of nature, it excites him.

But when it is like this, Suga thinks as he sits in the waiting room with his heart in his throat and tears streaming down his cheeks, when this is how the unpredictability of people emerges, an  unforeseeable manifestation of the most banal cruelty, losing yourself – _losing_ _control_ \- in waves of emotions you don’t even know you could feel, then maybe it’d be best if all our moves were part of a rehearsed sequence. At least that way he would be able to press stop, he could change the channel.

 

 

2013 – 2023 - 2031

 

The first time they talk about it they’re fifteen. Just kids themselves and still only friends to each other, tho the nature of Suga’s feelings has already taken a different form.

The sun is playing a game of tag with the clouds and when it breaks free from behind their threatening shadow it catches the perspiration on Daichi’s forehead and temples in a way Suga knows he shouldn’t find attractive. Even sweat looks good on Daichi, and Suga has recently started to think his heart never really had a chance to come out of this unscathed.

They are just talking between themselves, about things that seem so distant in the future all images and thoughts are blurry, mirage-like. Graduation, university, dream jobs waiting for them years away. Then Asahi, from his perch on a fallen branch a couple of feet away, asks almost timidly “Do you guys want children?”

His sister just had a baby, and lately that’s all Asahi talks about. His niece did this, his niece did that. Suga always listens to his tales with the fascination of a lonely child, of the youngest cousin. The only children he gets to meet are the ones who play in the park near his house. They always send their ball flying between too high branches and ask for Suga’s help when he walks by, and more often than not they beg him to join them too so he can teach them the right way to toss. Despite his lacking experience with children, or maybe because of this, Asahi’s question resonates in Suga’s brain and the answer comes naturally, flowing through his lips with ease.

“Absolutely, i want at least three!”

At his enthusiasm both Daichi and Asahi crack a smile and when Suga looks at Daichi and gestures for him to answer next Daichi holds his gaze for a moment, long enough for an annoying blush to crawl up Suga’s face, then nods in agreement.

“Yeah, a big family would be nice.”

That moment, that shared look, feel both incredibly significant and irrelevant to fifteen years old Suga. It’s not until about ten years later, when they’re finally together and Suga has discovered and committed to memory what Daichi’s skin tastes like, that it truly becomes important.

That moment, that shared look.

The second time they talk about children more than talking about it they mention it in passing, an accident really, before shying away. But Suga stores it in the most secret places of his heart, keeps it safe from the forgetfulness of time.

They’re twenty-five and still dizzy with the newness of this relantionship, taking each other by the hand and stealing kisses at any moment just because they can, after so many years spent hoping, hurting, and then hoping again. It’s a lazy afternoon, the both of them still exhausted after a weekend in company of Daichi’s family.

Suga is shamelessly lying on Daichi, head resting on his broad chest and fingers softly tracing the lines of Daichi’s biceps. “Do you think they liked me?”

Daichi’s hand comes up to play with his hair and Suga leans into the touch, his eyes closing in bliss. “They’ve known you for years, Suga.”

Suga shifts so he can look Daichi in the eyes and shakes his head briefly. “As your best friend, yeah. But this is the first time they’ve met me as your _boyfriend_.”

It feels so good, to use that word.

Daichi smiles at him and cups his cheek tenderly, his thumb tracing the mole near Suga’s eye. “They like you, ok? In any role, they like you. They’re _my_ parents, after all.”

“But i bet your cousin doesn’t, not after i set a ball to his face.”

That had been a traumatic experience, more so for Suga than for Daichi’s cousin, who’d looked pretty unfazed by the whole thing. He had brushed off all of Suga’s apologies, acting way too mature and composed for his seven years of age.

Daichi is chuckling now as he had the entire afternoon before. The traitor.

“I think he likes you a little too much actually. He always manages to run away when someone tries to kiss him goodbye, but when it was time to kiss _you_ goodbye he didn’t seem all that reluctant.”

Suga winks at him playfully. “What do i even do to these Sawamura boys!”

Daichi pinches him on the side and when Suga yelps he presses a soothing kiss on his cheek in apology. “Yeah, yeah. But you better start practicing again, _Sugawara-san_ , or when it’ll be time to teach _our kids_ volleyball we’ll have to buy sets of armor to protect them from your toss.”

It’s a joke, nothing but a joke but it doesn’t feel like one.

Suga stares at Daichi dumbfounded for a while, eyes wide and lips parted to form a perfect ‘o’. His heart is doing samersaults in his chest and beating like a hammer, and as close as they are he knows Daichi can feel it. Daichi on his part only resists a few seconds under his scrutiny and stammering out an embarrassed excuse he retreats to the kitchen to ‘’get started on dinner’’. It’s only 5 pm.

Once he’s alone Suga can’t suppress the smile threatening to split his face in halves but with Daichi he chooses not to mention it again, not yet.

Not for another eight years, at least, and this time it’s neither an answer to a harmless question nor an accidental admission.

It’s simple, really, as natural as the changing patterns of the tide. On another lazy day on the eve of a Karasuno reunion, Suga listens to the silence of their house, meets Daichi’s eyes and says “I want a baby.”

The smile Daichi gives him is blinding, the kisses he presses on Suga’s lips, on his nose, on his cheeks, the only answer Suga needs.

 

 

January 14th, 2033

 

 “A trash collector found her crying in a garbage bin.”

For a moment Suga thinks he heard wrong. He wishes he heard wrong. “ _A garbage bin?_ ”

The nurse nods and when Suga’s eyes fall again on the newborn baby sleeping soundly in one of the hospital incubators his vision turns red in anger.

It was his day off today. He’d planned to spend it all in bed, with Daichi. Have sex, eat, have more sex. But before the hand of the clock could come point at six he’d received a call from the head of his department. It usually takes him a while to wake up, an extra-strong coffee, a kiss from his husband, but when he’d heard the frenzy in Okada-san’s voice it’d had the same effect of a cold shower. He’d known, then, that something had happened. He’d known but this, he never could have pictured this.

Throw a newborn baby in a garbage bin. Who _the fuck_ does that?

“Get me an ultrasound machine please,” he asks. His voice is shaking, he knows.

“Should i also book a CT scan?”

All of a sudden he feels exposed, like his skin has been peeled off to leave all his organs uncovered. His accelerated heartbeat, the frenzy of his thoughts, his inability to catch his breath, everything is laid bare, for everyone to see.

_A baby in a garbage bin…_

For a moment he wants to cry. He wants to excuse himself and run to the bathroom, lock himself in a stall and not come out until his skin has grown back, thick enough to protect him from people’s stares.

_How can something like this happen?_

“Sensei?”

He starts at the nurse’s voice and when he meets her eyes she repeats the question, slowly, as if she were talking to a child. He flushes bright red on his cheeks and ears and clears his throat, tries to regain some of his composure.

_Act like a doctor, damnit._

“No, not for now. Let’s not expose her to unnecessary radiations unless we deem it necessary.”

The nurse nods at him satisfied and, with one last look at the child, leaves.

Hurried steps fade out down the corridor, and only now Suga notices the voices all around them. Booming, relentless. The police was called immediately and now agents crowd the door to the neonatal care ward like a pack of bloodhounds. Only bloodhounds would be _quieter_. The chief is still with them, trying to keep them in place and answer the questions he can answer, which are not many at the moment. It’s only a matter of time before the news spreads and the press joins them.

Suga tries to ignore them, ignore everything else but his patient – his _patient_ , - and opens the lid of the incubator to auscultate the baby’s heart and lungs. Under the cold touch of the stethoscope she squirms a little, her tiny legs kicking in indignation. Suga can’t help but smile at the sight.

“Well you are lively, that’s for sure,” he says.

She doesn’t reply, of course, doesn’t give any clue that she’s heard him. But still it’s always comforting to him, talking to the patients, it helps slow down his thoughts, fill the silence with more than the beeping of machines.

The end of the stethoscope covers the baby’s chest almost entirely and Suga’s heart gives a painful pang, faced with how _small_ she is.

Too small to be in the world.

Her heart is strong, beating calm and steady in Suga’s ears, but her lungs. Suga closes his eyes and curses. She breathes in and then out and Suga can hear the strain that simple, natural action causes. Her lungs are worn-out already, underdeveloped, weak. It makes sense, considering her size she must have been born at around the 32nd week of gestation and the lungs are the last organ to fully develop. It makes sense, and it sucks. Suga can’t find any other ways to put it.

 “We need to connect you to a ventilator, darling, or your heart will get tired too. But you can handle it, right?” he tells her.

He throws the stethoscope around his shoulders and gently pokes the baby on the nose. She corrugates her brow, her expression almost a scowl, and lets out a little wail of protest.

_Too small but made of tough stuff._

When Suga makes to move away she reaches out and wraps her fingers around his pinky. Suga stops, a statue of salt, and for a moment he doesn’t even dare draw in a breath for fear she might let go, for fear it might startle her, as if she were a panicky animal hiding in the tall grass of the prairie.

She isn’t and she doesn’t mind Suga’s loud exhale as she didn’t mind his forced, self-imposed quietness. She just holds onto him tight until she falls back asleep minutes later. Then her grip grows lax but it’s still inexplicably hard for Suga to pull away.

 

 

February – September 2031

 

The excitement that comes with the prospect of having a baby hits them like a wave, like the wind coloring your cheeks when you stick your head out of the car window. It changes everything even as nothing changes. They decide not to tell their friends about it, not immediately anyway. They would all get so excited, they would try to throw a party (and then some more) and all that enthusiasm would infect Daichi and Suga as well, and they can’t celebrate, not so soon.

Altho when they first send out the request for adoption they dance around the kitchen in just their underwear until the neighbor comes knocking on their door to tell them to keep it down. But nobody needs to know about this.

Daichi’s mom cries on her son’s shoulder for half an hour and then presses a wet kiss on both their cheeks. Then cries some more as her husband pats them both on the shoulder. He tries to assume a composed demeanor but Suga sees the suspicious brightness of his eyes, the way his hand shakes on Daichi’s shoulder. Daichi tears up too once they are alone in the car but when Suga strokes his cheek to catch a runaway drop his smile is soft and full of joy.

Suga’s father hugs them both tight and, with his usual reserved ways, brings down Suga’s old toy box and says “It’s time you take it, Koushi.”

The copper locks shine under the lights of the kitchen and when Suga drags a hand across the heavy, dark wood he finds it as smooth as he remembers. It’s clear his father has taken care of it all these years, it’s his own work after all and, in Suga’s opinion, his finest too. He’d started working on it as soon as his wife had announced she was pregnant, and throughout Suga’s childhood and adolescence it had been the first thing he associated with ‘home’. It’s imbued with all the love his father feels for him but that he’s never been too good at voicing.

Daichi and Suga look up all the procedures in their free time, they meet with social workers, with psychologists, with more social workers. They answer question after question, they open their home to strangers. They are stripped bare, their life laid out in front of them for people to analyze and dissect but – and that’s the worst of all - to judge.

“A pediatrician, that’s marvelous! Not to mention useful.”

Thank you. Yes, it is.

“A lawyer, your financial situation mustn’t be an issue.”

No, indeed it isn’t.

But somehow it’s not enough. Being financially stable, in a committed, years-old relationship and willing to cut down work hours, make all sorts of adjustments to be as involved in their child’s life as possible, it’s not enough. Nothing is enough in front of the fact that they’re two men. Nothing sticks to these strangers’ memory more than their gender, their sexuality. Until they find out about Suga’s leg, that is.

And that’s a different kind of hell. Some of the more ‘thorough’ social workers ask for receipts, query about his mental state, ask the name of the psychologist Suga went to to learn how to cope with his loss, they ask about his physical therapy, his mobility.

One of them in particular seems to be taken with his ‘’issue’’ as she calls it and comes as far asking “Do you think your trauma could cause you to harm your child?”

She writes an answer down even as Suga sits in stunned silence.

He and Daichi fight more than ever, argue over anything the other said and whether a misplaced ‘yes’ could have accounted for yet another rejection. At night, when the silence threatens to deafen them they reach out under the sheets and hold each other close. Till they stop shaking, till the tears stop falling.

“I would never…i would never do anything to harm our child.”

“I know, Koushi. I know.”

The guest room next to the master bedroom is emptied of all the clutter, the only thing they leave is the wooden toy box. They don’t dare paint it yet, they don’t buy any furniture. They stop in front of baby shops but never go in.

And then on a Saturday morning they get a call.

 

January 14th, 2033

 

It hits him as soon as his shift is over and Suga comes home that night feeling ten years older and a hundred pounds heavier.

This job takes a toll on people. That’s a fact, a reality he was forced to deal with when he lost his first patient years ago. He could have chosen to dedicate himself exclusively to research after that, after a day spent lying on his bed incapable of doing anything other than cry, but he didn’t. Truth is, he never even considered it. So he only had one option: get used to it. And he is now. He is used to tragic stories with even more tragic endings. He carries them with him everywhere he goes, like the names of his patients, the expression in their eyes. He carries them with him but they don’t sink him. Today tho, today this burden treathens to make him drown.

He looks for the keys in a daze and drops them on the ‘welcome’ mat with clumsy fingers. Through his eyes everything appears blurry, indistinguishable shapes and blotches of color. The black cat on the mat looks like an immense shadow, the boogeyman clouding children’s dreams, the letters are a confused jumble he can’t make sense of.

It takes him three tries to open the door and when he finds the lock he turns the key with so much frustrated force it almost snaps in halves.

Daichi is valiantly attempting to cook dinner and when he hears Suga’s steps in the entrance, the creaking of the parquet, he greets Suga with his usual crooked smile. The one Suga loves most, more pronounced on the right side and that makes the faint laughter lines near Daichi’s eyes stand out. It vanishes fast when he catches sight of Suga’s expression and Suga misses it already.

He’s there in three steps and as his arms come around Suga’s waist and hold him Suga finally feels like he can breathe. He clings onto Daichi, fingers digging in the fabric of Daichi’s shirt and in his flesh. It must sting but Daichi doesn’t make a sound and Suga doesn’t let go, doesn’t loosen his grip. He can’t.

 “What happened?”

Daichi’s voice is a low whisper but still it resonates in the house, makes Suga’s whole body vibrate.

Suga breathes in wetly and Daichi’s scent, the scent of home, surrounds him, replacing the antiseptic and aggressive, plastic cleanness of citrus. His hands stop trembling. “We had a new patient…a baby found in a trash bin…”

His words comes out unsteady, muffled by the skin of Daichi’s neck but Daichi understands anyway. He holds him tighter and they start swaying from side to side, like they did on their wedding, like they still do from time to time when they are feeling silly. Only now there’s no music playing.

“I heard it on the news but i didn’t know she had been taken to your hospital.”

Suga shakes his head, as if to shut out that child’s face from his mind, the way she’d held onto him like he’s holding onto Daichi now. Tight, and real. Her grip had been strong and her fingers, as small as they were, so impossibly warm around his. Suga can still feel it hours later, the ghost of that touch. That warmth that had spread everywhere inside him.

“She is just a baby, Daichi, she is so _small_ …”

Daichi sighs shakily and presses a kiss on his hair. Lingers, kisses him once more. He is trembling too, now.

It’s been two years, two years since they first sent out that request, since they first let themselves really hope, and here they are now. Nothing has changed, it’s all still nothing but a dream, that vanishes as soon as sunlight hits their eyes.

There are people, people who throw their children in trash bins while their baby’s room is still nothing but a guest room. Empty but for an old toy box.

It’s not fair.

In the silence of the house Daichi lets out a sob, of resignation, or maybe it’s fury, and Suga’s hands uncurl quick, come to rest on the small of his back. Daichi leans in his touch, leans on him, and now they are holding each other. Steady enough, strong enough to keep themselves upright. Like always, like they’d promised that day in September as they were sharing vows.

 

 

October – November 2031

 

Kaori-san comes into their lives in a whirlwind of bright-colored leggings and even brighter smiles.

There’s good chemistry between them from the start and one of the first things she tells them upon meeting with her is that she has no problem with them being two men. She is young, only 21, and still in college and she shares a more liberal view of the world, one that’s becoming more and more common in new generations.

But still in the beginning Daichi and Suga are both wary. They let their families be happy for them first and seek the other’s hand to keep themselves grounded when they know their hearts are taking flight.

Kaori-san visits them several times, sometimes with the social worker that’s handling her case, sometimes alone.

“I don’t know if i should do this, but i can’t really get to know you guys if you are both walking on eggshells trying to please her,” she admits one day, tongue in cheek and a bag of mochi in her hands.

And what else can they do, if not let her in?

She is easy to be around, weird considering the age gap but she is smart, perceptive. She’s studying law so it’s easy to find arguments to talk about with Daichi, always the harder of the two to win over. She fits into their lives like a missing puzzle piece and slowly they let themselves relax, they let themselves hope.

When they ask about the father of the baby she just shrugs and says “He doesn’t even know. Probably doesn’t even remember we were together.”

It happened at a party, they were both drunk, it was a stupid mistake. That’s how she puts it but her face darkens at whatever memory crosses her mind so they don’t push for explanations, they don’t ask for any details. She seems grateful for that, and when she leaves she kisses them both on the cheek. Daichi closes the door behind her and when he meets Suga’s eyes they share a tentative smile.

It goes on like this for a couple of months and their meetings soon become weekly. Sometimes they go out, Suga brings Kaori to his favorite cafè and they talk for what seems like hours about the best cupcake toppings and which places make the best super spicy mapo tofu in the city.

They all go for a walk in the park one day and when Kaori finds out Suga and Daichi played volleyball together in high school she lightens up.

“I have two left feet, i swear. I was always the last pick in P.E. so if the kid takes after me it might still have a chance with you two as his parents.”

_Parents._

Suga’s heart speeds up at the word, and he blindly reaches out for Daichi’s hand. They find each other immediately and Daichi’s hand is shaking, clammy with nerves, but when Suga squeezes it Daichi squeezes back.

The next day Daichi comes home with a box under his arm and hands it to Suga almost sheepishly. Suga opens it in one swift move, curious, and then throws his head back and laughs and laughs, his whole body shaking with the force of his joy. It’s a onesie for a newborn baby, powder blue with pink shrimps on. The buttons are shaped like jellyfish.

 “I saw it and i couldn’t not buy it…”

Suga cups Daichi’s neck and drags him down for a kiss, that becomes two and then three. And then they become so many it’s hard for him to keep count.

He puts the onesie in the last drawer of the dresser later, folded neatly in a corner, and feels the fabric with a silly smile on his face.

A years later it still lies there, unused and without a wrinkle.

 

 

January 30th, 2033

 

In the two weeks that follow the baby gains three pounds. She responds well to the treatments and her lungs grow stronger, slowly, yes, but steadily. She becomes more active, shakes her tiny fists when the nurses fuss over her, and even manages to kick her blanket away one night. When Suga checks on her the next morning she is blissfully napping on it and furrows her brow when Suga covers her again.

 No one comes for her and the DNA samples the lab collects don’t take the police anywhere. The number of journalists near the room thins down every day and other stories have replaced hers in the front pages, other characters have become the object of the crowd’s sympathy and rightful indignation.

But she stays here, confined in the same incubator, attached to the same machines.

She doesn’t have a name yet, nobody is in their rights to give her one. When they refer to her nurses and doctors alike call her the ‘the trash bin baby’. It makes Suga sick to his stomach.

“Nobody deserves to be called that. Especially you,” he tells her one day.

She is sleeping, then, her small chest going up and down following the rhythm of her breath. This is all she is conscious of now, the struggle of living, of making sure another breath will follow the previous. She doesn’t know anything else but the beating of her heart, she has no clue what’s going on around her, what people whisper with a hand covering their mouth. She doesn’t know how she came to be here.

But still, but still this can’t be how people will remember her. This can’t be what tells her apart from the other children in the ward.

 

“I mean, i can’t be the only one who finds it disgusting, right?”

In his indignation Suga almost trips on the pants he’s trying to get out of. He manages to catch himself on the edge of the dresser just as Daichi wraps an arm around his waist, alarmed.

“Jeez Suga be careful, will you?”

Suga waves his concern off with a flick of his wrist but goes to sit on the bed when Daichi gives him a pointed look and as soon as his behind hits the mattress he involuntarily lets out a contented sigh. Daichi chuckles and kneels down between his legs.

“Stayed on your feet all day, uh?”

Suga hums and then the relief turns into a painful hiss in his mouth as Daichi takes off his prosthetic leg. The skin encased in the socket is a little red. Daichi regards him with poorly veiled reproach and looks around in the bedside drawer for the ointment.

“I had a surgery. Went on for seven – _oh_ – h-hours…”

Daichi applies the ointment and massages his sore muscles with his marvelous hands, a light scowl on his face. “And after it was over i bet you swiftly went to one of the hospital’s numerous on-call rooms to get some rest.”

Suga looks away from him guiltily. There’s absolutely no use in lying to his husband, they’ve known each other for twenty years, so in a whisper he admits, “I spent the rest of my shift with the baby girl.”

Daichi doesn’t need to ask which baby girl Suga is talking about. “You still could have sat somewhere tho. I’m sure there are chairs in the neonatal unit,” he says but his expression has cleared up a little.

“You are right. Of course you’re right.”

Suga reaches out and cards his fingers through Daichi’s hair. It’s soft under his touch and he can’t suppress a smile when some grey catches his eyes. Daichi always made fun of him for his ‘’old man hair’’ but at least now _he_ doesn’t have to worry about slowly turning into a silver fox.

“So people call her that, uh?”

Suga starts at Daichi’s voice suddenly breaking the silence and raises an eyebrow at him in confusion.

“That baby, you said your colleagues call her trash can baby or something?”

As if someone had lit a match inside him as soon as Daichi reminds him of it Suga feels his insides burn. “Yes, can you believe professionals would do something like this?”

The hand resting on his lap curls into a fist to cover how bad it’s shaking. It doesn’t work, of course, as Daichi gently covers it with one of his own, a little sticky from the ointment but warm, and welcomed.

“It’s just…there are so many other things they could call her!”

Suga looks down, in Daichi’s eyes, almost pleadingly. He doesn’t know why it’s so important, that Daichi understands how truly amazing that child is, how strong, but it is. It’s necessary.

“She is a feisty one, you know? She really is so why can’t she be singled out for that? She’s been getting better fast, she is fighting tooth and nail every day for the life she has. This is what’s truly remarkable about her. Not the way she was found, _cruelty_ has nothing to do with her, but the way she is trying to stay alive.”

A miracle baby, that’s what she is. That’s how Suga has come to think of her.

And she proves him right every day.

“She is something special, Daichi. She doesn’t deserve this, any of this.”

And Daichi nods quickly, in front of Suga’s fervor he can’t do anything if not agree. He stands up and kisses Suga’s flushed cheeks, his quivering lips. He lingers on Suga’s mole, and his hands come up to steady his shoulders. They are shaking too, like the rest of him.

And Suga understands.

 “I care too much, this is not…it’s not good.”

Daichi moves away a little, just enough to look Suga in the eyes, his gaze intense through his reading glasses. He still doesn’t say anything and through the frenzy of his nerves Suga realizes he is waiting for something, for an explanation Suga knows he can’t give yet.

His heart hammers in his chest, feeding off of the uncertainty and the agitation that make his limbs turn to butter. He doesn’t know why he said that, why he started to share a thought he is not sure he can finish, why he tried to express feelings he can’t even name - or maybe, he is just too scared of naming them.

All he knows now is that he feels so tired.

 Daichi’s hand rises, follows the narrow line of Suga’s shoulders and strokes his neck, teases the sensitive skin of his nape and then stops to cup his cheek. “It’s exactly because you care that you’re so good at your job.”

_But it shouldn’t be like this. This, this is too much even for me._

 He doesn’t say.

 There is a sharpness in the look Daichi is giving him, an intent. This is a test as much as it’s an honest truth. It’s a discussion already had before, Daichi’s words are as familiar as Suga’s insecurities and in the past, any other time, Suga always tried to shrug those reassurances off while his heart lifted - imperceptibly and immensely - in his chest and a grateful smile curved his lips.

But today his heart stays heavy.

This – this situation, this feeling taking form like brush strokes on a canvas - is already slipping through his fingers. Those words, it’s not his insecurities talking, taking over. This runs even deeper, deeper than a childhood-old inferiority complex, it mingles with the blood flowing in his veins and spreads everywhere in his body. It’s already taking root, becoming part of him. And maybe he is projecting, maybe it’s just his battered heart looking for a way to fill the hole that disappointment after disappointment have dug, slow like the erosion of rocks by the hand of relentless waves. But it doesn’t feel like projecting, this – whatever this is-  feels familiar but he can’t point out why. It feels completely new, and endlessly vast. Terrifying. He doesn’t know it, not yet, so he stays quiet.

He leans into Daichi’s touch and grazes his warm palm with his lips.

“I’m sorry.”

_I’m sorry i can’t say more, i’m sorry i don’t have any answers to give._

“It’s alright,” Daichi tells him, his voice calm and soothing, “you’ll tell me in time.”

Suga covers Daichi’s hand with his own and links their fingers together. Daichi’s wedding ring warms under Suga’s touch and Suga traces it with his fingertips. He can almost feel the words engraved on the inside, burning hot and printing themselves on his skin. _One in two._

He presses his lips on silver and hears an intake in Daichi’s breath.

“Thank you,” Suga says. For not pushing, for being there. For too many things to mention.

Daichi doesn’t answer, just leans forward, toward him, and kisses him deep.

Then the house fills with the sound of their moans. Suga whispers ‘i love you’ in every corner of Daichi’s body.

 

Suga walks over to her on his usual round, today like every day – she is his first and last stop - and checks her vitals, takes her temperature. Good brain activity, steady heartbeat. 36.9°C. Everything looks good and Suga’s heart squeezes almost painfully in his chest under the overwhelming sense of pride that hits him. Without thinking he reaches out and strokes her cheek with the back of his finger.

“You are doing good, baby love.”

The endearment slips through the crown of his teeth and settles in between the constant beeping of monitors and the quiet chatter of parents come to check on their children. It hangs in the air as if on a silver thread, catches the cold lights of the room and casts a honeyed hue on the somber, grey walls.

In his heart, and only in his heart, Suga starts calling her Ai.

 

 

December 2031

 

Kaori is visiting them today. She came around soon after lunch hour, red in the cheeks and ruffled with a bag full of books on her shoulder. When Suga comes home at 8:30 she’s still here, and the living room table has disappeared under dozens of textbooks and papers.

Daichi is sitting with her and animatedly explaining her the concept and application of the argumentum a contrario. What a nerd. He looks up when he hears the front door open and throws Suga a soft smile when their eyes meet.

“Good evening, Suga-san,” Kaori greets him and her voice sounds strangely dull and flat. She looks about ready to lie down on the floor and cry.

_Ah college…_

Suga walks over to her and puts a comforting hand on her shoulder, then asks Daichi “Did you get started on dinner, _dear_?”

Daichi sits up a little straighter in his chair, mildly alarmed by the cutesy name and when their eyes meet Suga silently gestures at Kaori and her clear exhaustion. It takes a moment for Daichi to crack his message but when Kaori yawns he seems to almost shrink in his perfectly tailored shirt.

“No, um, i forgot…”

“Of course you did.”

Suga throws a smile at Kaori and asks her what she would like for dinner. “I’m in no mood to cook, but we can order something…”

Her relief is evident and while Suga makes the call she helps Daichi set the table and talks his ears off about a coursemate of hers who once took a pineapple to class and ate it with all its skin.

Dinner proceeds smoothly and Kaori devours everything near her line of sight. When she catches them – rudely – staring she flushes and attempts to give an apology but Suga waves her off, leans on the other side of the table and swats the back of Daichi’s head.

“S-suga what-”

“I can’t believe you! She’s been here for what, four five hours and you never thought of offering her something to eat. I bet you didn’t even let her take a break,” he turns to face Kaori, “am i right?”

Her silence is answer enough.

“That’s a good way to impress someone, Daichi, really. You are such a good host.”

Daichi leans over to him, his entire face red with mortification, and hisses “You just hit me and lectured me in front of our _guest_ , how is that for good impressions?”

Before Suga can think of a reply, Kaori’s laughter fills the room, loud and a little squeaky. “You two are too much!” she says, her voice broken and out of breath, only to start laughing again.

Suga and Daichi share an embarrassed look and get up to clear the table.

They tell Kaori to go sit on the couch while they wash the dishes and she acquiesces with a pleased hum. Nearing her seventh month she often complains about back pains and staying hunched on books all afternoon surely has not helped.

Suga gives Daichi another reproachful look but when Daichi looks away, chagrined, a stab of guilt hits Suga in the side. He moves in closer with the excuse of taking another plate to dry and bumps their hips together gently.

Daichi presses close against him and Suga does the same, hiding a grin behind his bangs.

Daichi puts down the plate he is washing and wraps an arm around Suga’s waist, his hand falling low to follow the curve of Suga’s hip. His hand is still wet, his fingers cold as they slither under Suga’s shirt to graze at his bare skin. It makes Suga shiver. Suga molds his body to Daichi’s and presses a soft kiss on his jaw.

He’s about to do it again, start something more, when Kaori calls out to them from the other room, reminding them that they are very much _not_ alone.

“Guys! Hey, you two?”

They both run out of the kitchen, looking like a pair of children caught in the middle of making mischief. Kaori has both hands pressed on her baby bump and an almost manic expression on her face. “The baby is kicking,” she says with a chuckle.

Suga and Daichi almost trip on the carpet in their haste to get to her. The baby started kicking a while ago, of course, Kaori often talks about it trying to feign annoyance, but they never got to feel it before.

She puts both their hands on her stomach and tells them to wait. They do, they stay so still they don’t even dare breathe but when the baby finally – _finally_ – kicks, right where their palms are splayed, they both gasp as if they weren’t expecting it.

“Suga, Suga did you-”

“Yeah, oh Daichi…”

Their eyes meet and they laugh and laugh because that’s their baby, an their baby just kicked them. He is right there, under their palms. He is real in a way he hasn’t really been before. He is real and this is really happening. Suga feels dizzy with this knowledge, with everything that’s happening to them, and Daichi’s eyes are wet with tears.

The baby kicks again, in the same spot, and Kaori starts laughing too. “It’s amazing, isn’t it?” she asks, and her voice is soft, like Suga has never heard it before.

Daichi nods, enthusiastically, but Suga freezes for a moment and glances up at her. She is still looking down, at her belly, and a small smile graces her face, enraptured and amazed, the expression in her eyes so unspeakably sweet.

Suga’s heart skips a beat at the sight and then starts beating fast, with the frenzy of a herd of terrified gazelles running away from a hungry lioness. Uneasiness spreads everywhere inside of him to settle heavy in his throat and no matter how hard he tries he can’t seem to swallow it down.

That look on her face, he’s been dreading it since they all first met.

His panicked silence earns him a look from Daichi and a concerned question from Kaori. He shrugs them both off, tells them it’s nothing but only when Kaori leaves, with a reassuring “I’m so excited for you guys!” he lets himself relax.

The next day he receives a text from Kaori where she asks to grab a coffee together.

well a coffee 4 u and a tea 4 me ˚‧º·(˚ ˃̣̣̥⌓˂̣̣̥ )‧º·˚

He looks at the emoji, the easy wording of her text, and breathes a sigh of relief.

_It’s alright_ , he tells himself, _it’s all going to be alright_.

_She wouldn’t do this to us._

 

 

February 27th, 2033

 

 As you are living it can you ever _know_ that moment is going to change your life?

 

Six weeks after she arrived at the hospital, Suga and the chief both agree that Ai can be taken off the respirator. She’ll be monitored more carefully but her lungs have become stronger, it’s a good time for her to learn to breathe autonomously.

Impulsively he texts Daichi to tell him the news and Daichi replies almost immediately, with a simple ‘ _that’s great koushi!!_ ’ and a little heart. It might look like platitudes to anyone else, but to Suga, who’s had to suffer Daichi’s terrible texting habits for twenty years – replies after hours, soulles 2 syllables tops long remarks and a depressing lack of emojis or any punctuation but full stops – it’s everything.

He does his rounds as per usual then, but it’s like the atmosphere inside the hospital has shifted. He doesn’t even mind when his leg starts to ache and he has to take a seat in one of the on-call rooms.

It’s a quiet day, but Suga doesn’t dare voice it like some of his colleagues for fear he might jinx it. He goes to the E.R to see if some assistance is needed but even there it’s relatively calm. For once the world seems to have slowed down, and Suga smiles a private smile, waves at the nurses at the reception and turns back around. His feet carry him through familiar hallways.

He goes to her.

It’s pretty late, his shift started early in the afternoon, so the neonatal ward is pretty much empty, there’s only a couple of nurses walking by quietly through the cribs. She is sleeping already, or still depending on how you see it, but in her defence there isn’t much for her to do here, except cry and stare at the ceiling.

Suga auscultates her lungs for a moment, then her heart, and once he’s made sure everything is fine he sighs in relief and just lets her be.

She is sleeping with her little fist near her face and once again her blanket is a tangled mess at the bottom of the crib. She is the loveliest thing Suga has ever seen. On an already easy day he feels his heart lighten even more, the line of his spine straightens, stretches upwards like the stem of a sunflower reaching out to the morning light.

He reaches out to stroke her cheek, something he’s been doing a whole lot lately, when a nurse comes in. She starts at the sight of him but then they both cordially greet each other in whispers.

She is here to take a child to his mom, she explains. “Poor thing only just woke up after 19 hours of labor.”

Suga winces in sympathy and helps her with the baby when his little hat falls down. Then Ai lets out a small wail and Suga runs to her. He gestures to the nurse that he’s got this and she walks out, leaving him alone with Ai…and a dozen more children that could wake up anytime.

Ai whimpers, a more irritated sound, and Suga does the only thing he can think of: he takes her in his arms.

She looks so impossibly tiny now and for a second Suga feels too big, too clumsy, too rough. He could drop her, he could accidentally twist her arm, he could poke her in the eye with his oafish fingers…then her head comes to rest, perfect, in the crook of his elbow, her hand closes around the fabric of his sweater and the world falls calm.

 

Life is made of moments, we know, but the real trick is recognizing the ones that truly matter, and keep them close to our chest.

But how do we _do_ that?

When Suga first met Daichi he had no clue he was shaking hands with the boy who would become his husband. The jolt of electricity he felt at the touch went ignored, for months on end, until that irrational pull became too strong, too all-encompassing. Scattering all of his excuses and rational thoughts.

The first time he had to examine a child he identified a heart abnormality that, causing seizures, had been so far treated as epilepsy. His supervisor told him then that he had a knack for Peds and made him assist her during surgery. As soon as it was over Suga threw up his lunch in nerves but three months later when he had to declare his specialization he knew exactly what to say.

So does the moment need to end before we can realize how significant it had been? How thoroughly it’s going to change our life, and shape the person we are going to be?

Maybe it simply depends on the moment, maybe it’s all down to us and how willing we are to accept that change, or welcome new possibilities. Whether or not we are ready to just…let people in. Sometimes we take minutes, or days, oftentime we take years to see the effects a simple action, a choice, a glance had on our course, sometimes we never do, and we can’t do much except regret. But sometimes, sometimes we are lucky enough to recognize the signs as we are staring right at them.

It only takes a moment, it only takes _this_ moment for Suga to realize it’s his daughter he is holding in his arms.

 

 

January 2032

 

Kaori acts the same as always in the following weeks, bubbly and loud, talks a mile per minute about nothing and everything. School, her parents, the small apartment she’s planning to move in with his friend.

She stops talking about the baby, tho. All talk related to it is started by Daichi, or Suga, or the social worker when she’s present.

Do you want us with you in the delivery room?

Yeah, sure.

What do you think of this color for the baby’s room?

It’s nice.

How are you feeling? Is the baby kicking keeping you up at night?

No, no it’s fine.

And Suga should have seen it, like he’d noticed that look he should have noticed her sudden reticence to talk about the baby. But he doesn’t, and as time passes, as he thinks back on it, Suga will come to the realization that the reason why he didn’t is simple as it is obvious: he didn’t want to.

He _doesn’t_ want to. It took him and Daichi a year to finally get this chance, to get that call-back, to be seen by someone as people fit to raise a child. And now they are here, in a little more than a month they’ll have a baby keeping them up all night, spitting milk on them, and probably even peeing on them if they are not careful and Suga cannot wait.

It feels like he’s been waiting all his life for this moment, and maybe he really has. He’s had to see his straight friends get pregnant without even trying, he’s had to attend baby showers and birthday parties. He is the godfather of three wonderful children, and honorary uncle of another dozen and he is happy. He’s always been over the moon happy for every single one of his friends, genuinely and wholeheartedly excited for them. But now it’s time he feels some of that happiness for himself, and for Daichi.

And they are so close. They are so close to have for themselves the last thing they felt was missing that they can’t even bring themselves to think this might not turn the way they’d wished, _prayed_ for.

Suga can’t think that, not after all this time, after everything he and Daichi have already been through together. Ignoring their feelings, trying to love other people, then coming out to their family, to their friends. Discrimination, insults, and then the accident. Suga losing his leg. No, no this has to go well. It will go well, Suga repeats it to himself like a mantra, until he starts to believe it.

He ignores the signs, and when Kaori’s due date is only six weeks away, he and Daichi start painting the baby’s room.

 

“We should have done this sooner…”

Suga sighs and fixes Daichi with a pointed look. “You’re the one who said not to, in case we jinxed ourselves.”

A shiver runs down Suga’s spine but he ignores it, chooses to stare once more at the roll of paint on the wall. Daichi has fallen silent too and for a moment Suga thinks he offended him with his true-talk – Daichi can be such a touchy baby of a man sometimes – but then Daichi makes his way to him and stops only when he’s right behind Suga.

Suga makes to turn around but Daichi puts his hand on his hips and holds him close to his chest, so close Suga has some trouble breathing. Or maybe that’s just caused by Daichi’s nearness, his broad chest pressed flush against Suga’s back, the warmth of his breath on Suga’s neck.

After ten years together Suga has to wonder if the time will ever come, for him, when Daichi’s closeness will stop affecting him and turning his brain to mush.

“What are you doing?” he tries to ask, humorously, but his voice comes out too soft, and a little lower than his usual tone.

Daichi starts swaying slightly on his feet, dragging Suga into it too, and Suga lets out a startled chuckle. “What’s gotten into you all of a sudden?”

Daichi shrugs and hides his face in the crook of Suga’s neck. “It’s just…it’s really happening, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, yeah it is.”

Suga rests his head on Daichi’s and lets him be for a moment. Then he catches sight of a splotch of olive green Daichi had painted earlier to see its effect on the wall and shudders.

“How the hell did we think that green was a good idea?”

And Daichi laughs.

They take half a day to settle on a color. Even tho they’ve both known for a while that they are going to have a boy Suga absolutely rejects the idea of painting the walls blue.

“Our bedroom has blue walls, our bathroom has blue walls. There are blue curtains everywhere in the house and we mostly use blue sheets and tablecloths as well. I don’t want to live in the Smurfs’ house!”

“How about yellow then?”

“Too insignificant.”

“Red?”

“For a baby’s room? Hell no.”

“Well, what’s left that you haven’t turned down already, Koushi? Orange?”

They share a look and smile.

“Obviously it won’t be the same orange as our uniforms…”

“Obviously.”

“But a…pastel orange, does that exist? Pastel orange would be nice.”

Suga leans into Daichi and presses a smacking kiss on his cheek. “You are a genius.”

Daichi grins at him, wide and a little goofy, and passes an arm around Suga’s waist. “Of course i am, that’s why you married me.”

Suga plasters himself on Daichi’s side and playfully bites his earlobe. Enjoys the way Daichi closes his eyes at the gesture and hums low in his throat.

“Actually i married you for your hot bod, _babe_.”

 

The painting itself takes an entire day because Suga is the only one willing to climb on their ‘old, shabby ladder’. Daichi calls it that, but truth be told there’s hardly anything shabby or threatening about it, it’s just that Daichi doesn’t feel comfortable unless he has both feet firmly planted on the ground. Not that he would ever admit it.

They work slowly, their hold on the brushes awkward and their strokes tentative. Anyone could tell they’ve never really done this before but they didn’t even consider calling a professional for this. It’s their child’s room, their son is going to sleep here in a matter of weeks and maybe it’s weird but they don’t want anyone else – especially a bunch of strangers – to get involved.

They’ve been poked and prodded and judged by strangers for months and months, but this little thing, this moment is just their own.

“Suga, you’re dripping paint on me!”

Suga looks down mid-stroke and sees an orange spot stand out among the black of Daichi’s hair, right in the middle of his head. He laughs.

“I was just trying…to recreate….our jersey…” he manages to say between wheezes, and as his shoulders shake more drops of color fall on Daichi’s head.

Suga laughs even harder.

“D-damnit, Koushi!”

Daichi moves away from under the ladder and fixes Suga with a haughty glare. “Really now. You are 34 years old and you still act like a chil-”

Suga waves the brush around in Daichi’s direction and sprays him with more paint. Daichi is left to sputter for a second, indignated, and when he regains some composure Suga catches his eyes and throws him a challenging look.

“Oh, so this is what you’re after, uh?”

Suga raises his chin and flicks the brush threateningly. “What if it is?”

Daichi grips the brush better and simply says “You’re on.”

Despite having started it Suga’s disavantage is clear from the start. He’s stuck on the ladder, having to twist weirdly around to reach Daichi, and the paint bucket is in Daichi’s corner. He was doomed from the start. His healthy leg tires soon of sustaining all his weight and when Daichi presses close to him, effectively trapping him in his arms, Suga reaches out and throws an arm around Daichi’s shoulders for support.

Daichi smirks at him. “Do you yield, my love?”

Suga pretends to think about it for a moment, then shrugs and say “No.”

Daichi raises an eyebrow. “You do realize you’re doomed, right?”

Suga leans in and presses his cheek against Daichi’s. “Hmm,” he answers.

Daichi drags his lips up and down Suga’s neck, not quite kissing, and then stops to suck at the skin under his ear. Suga shudders under Daichi’s mouth and his hand rises from Daichi’s shoulders to his nape to tug at Daichi’s hair.

“Do you yield?” Daichi asks again.

Suga shakes his head and smiles to himself when Daichi’s fingers move under the strap of Suga’s overalls and make it slide down his shoulder. Daichi kisses the moles on Suga’s collarbones and at once Suga knows he’s won.

“Do you yield now?”

“No.”

Suga throws both arms around Daichi’s waist and pulls him even closer. He paints a strip of color on the back of Daichi’s shirt with a gentle flick of wrist and at the same time grinds against Daichi’s crotch.

Daichi lets out a slow moan and drops his brush on the floor.

 

“You tricked me,” Daichi says later, half-naked and panting.

Suga throws him a cheeky grin, made softer by the orgasm he just had, and presses a kiss on his shoulder.

They are back in their bedroom, lying upside down on their bed – they couldn’t just do _it_ in their baby’s room – and Daichi looks absolutely flabbergasted at his husband’s ploy.

Suga cards his fingers through Daichi’s hair and gestures at their debauched state. “But you have to admit it was an enjoyable trick.”

Daichi looks at him with laughter in his eyes. “I love you…”

“I know.”

“But our kid better not take after you on this, or i’m keeping him locked up in his room until he’s 25.”

 

 

March 12th, 2033

 

There is no word strong enough to explain the surge of emotion that hits Suga whenever he gets to hold Ai in his arms. All he knows is that it feels right, not quite in the way doing his job feels right but more like slipping the ring on Daichi’s finger had.

It’s a heady feeling and when he allows his mind to linger on it he finds he can do nothing else but run to her.

The nurses in the neonatal ward seem confused by Suga’s frequent visits at first but then, with all the things they have to do, they just greet him politely and ignore him. And that’s good because Suga’s rehearsed response gets old after a while.

“Newborn babies are sensible to environment. Human touch, hearing a person’s heartbeat and feeling their warmth is incredibly helpful for full recovery.”

It’s not like he’s lying either, but still he could have instructed the nurses to do it. As it is the situation is unusual to third parts but Suga really can’t bring himself to care.

On bad day, on good days, when he can – if he can – he walks to Ai’s crib, takes her in his arms and smiles. One night a nurse brings a chair in the far corner of the room and gestures for him to sit, looking pointedly at his leg. She is one of the oldest nurses here, Hayakawa-san, she has assisted Suga in many surgeries, she was the one who came to visit him more often after the accident. She is also the only nurse who’s never asked for explanations to his being here, and when she gently pats his hand and says “She is beautiful, sensei,” Suga understands why.

 

At the end of his shift, today like all days, Suga makes a quick detour to wish Ai goodnight. It’s meant to be a quick thing, he has a dinner date with Daichi later, but as usual his eyes land on her precious face and time seems to disappear.

As he is sitting down Ai opens her eyes. She doesn’t cry, she doesn’t purse her lips in the way she does when something is bothering her, she just stares at him with her round, brown eyes. From so close their color is really similar to that of Daichi’s eyes and Suga’s heart seems to grow ten sizes at the sight.

“Do you want to hear a story, Ai-chan?”

She makes a soft, gurgling noise that Suga takes as a ‘yes’. He leans back in his chair, adjusts his grip on her so she is resting her cheek on his chest and starts narrating.

“Once upon a time, in a beautiful kingdom named Karasuno, lived a very handsome prince. His name was Daichi…”

 

“…and so the evil crow was banned from Karasuno. When Prince Daichi woke from his slumber and realized his friend Suga had been the one to save him and his kingdom he got on one knee and proposed right then and there. Suga accepted, and they all lived happily ever after. Oh, and Suga’s sidekick, Shrimpy, was made first knight of the round table!”

“So there was also a round table!”

Suga jumps in his seat, startled, and looks up from Ai’s face to meet Daichi’s amused eyes. He is leaning on the door frame of the nursery, dressed sharply in black slacks and the tailored red button down he knows is Suga’s favourite and looking at Suga – at them – as if he’s the only thing in the world worth seeing. He is a vision and Suga had a date with this walking, talking dream tonight. _Shit_.

“Oh, shoot. Daichi i’m so sorry, i’ll go get changed right away-”

Daichi smiles at him and when Suga makes to stand up he stops him with a quick shake of his head. He’s the one that comes to him – to them – and leans down to press a tender kiss on Suga’s lips.

“It’s alright, we’ve still got about forty-five minutes, and the resturant is nearby anyway.”

Then he looks down, at the sleepy baby Suga is holding in his arms, and his already fond expression softens even more.

“So this is her.”

He raises a tentative hand and, at Suga’s encouraging nod, gently strokes Ai’s hair. She raises her face a little, still snuggled up to Suga’s chest, and opens her eyes to stare up at Daichi.

Daichi’s sharp intake of breath seems to echo in the quiet of the room and when Suga looks at him he sees in those eyes all the confused amazement and wonder he’s been feeling himself since Ai came into his life.

“Oh Koushi, she’s so _beautiful_ …”

Suga smiles at him, full of pride, and then looks around to see if anyone is coming. Not a soul, good.

“Hold her for a second, will you? I need to get up,” he says, his gaze fixed on Daichi’s face.

Daichi freezes for a moment and swallows heavily in nerves. “I don’t think i should…” he starts to say but when Suga makes to give him the baby his arms are already around her shoulder and under her bottom.

Suga’s heart starts beating so fast at the sight he’s afraid it might explode inside his ribcage. Ai looks so impossibly tiny in Daichi’s arms, nestled tenderly on his broad chest, and Daichi is so obviously enraptured by her and so careful in all his gestures as if afraid he could drop her at any moment.

Suga stands up and presses a kiss on his cheek to reassure him. Daichi leans into the touch and when their eyes meet again he looks twenty years younger, he looks like the boy that first stole Suga’s heart, staring at their skilled captain and thinking he could never possibly be able to reach his level.

“I didn’t know,” he stammers, “i didn’t know it would be like this…”

Suga kisses him again, this time on the temple, and simply nods at his words. There isn’t much he can say now that’ll help Daichi make sense of what he is feeling, Suga has come to understand there’s simply no making sense of this, no rational explanation nor logic.

Approaching steps force him out of his own head and he gestures for Daichi to put Ai in her crib. Daichi was right earlier, they shouldn’t have done this, Suga shouldn’t have done this but he needed to know. He _had_ to know if he was alone in this or not, and now…now he is certain.

This is _their_ daughter.

Daichi lays her down reluctantly, the same way Suga does each night, and steps out of nursery in quick steps. Suga covers her with the blanket and after a quick goodbye he follows.

 

They made it in time for dinner but barely, Suga had to make do with the clothes he’d been wearing all day under his lab coat, but it’s nice being out for a while. So nice they decide to walk around for a while after, hand in hand and swinging their arms like little kids.

Daichi breaks their easy silence as they are making their way around the park “It was good, the story you were telling…”

Suga groans and hides his face in his free hand, mortified. “How much did you hear?”

Daichi laughs at his embarrassment – the bastard – and pulls him closer to his side. “I got in right when the Prince’s best knights, Noya and Ryuu, attempted to defeat the evil crow and got almost pecked to death.”

Suga stares at him, mouth agape in surprise for a moment then dabs him in the side. “You jerk, that’s at the beginning of the story! Did you really stand there like a creep for so long?”

“What? It was a great story, you know? Very engaging.”

Daichi smirks and lets Suga’s hand go to wrap an arm around his waist. “I especially enjoyed the fact that the _handsome_ prince of Karasuno was named after me.”

Suga scoffs and weakly tries to free himself from Daichi’s hold. “He was not named after _you_ , it was just a coincidence.”

“Oh, so basically you’re saying i’m not handsome.”

“Yes exactly. You are hideous and repulsive and i loathe even the simple sight of y-”

Daichi rudely shuts him up with a kiss. His free hand moves to cup Suga’s face, his thumb teasing the sensitive skin under Suga’s ear and when Suga moans, low in throat, he takes advantage of it to lick his bottom lip and let their tongues finally meet. By the time they break apart Suga is panting, red in the cheeks and warm all over, his hands clinging on the fabric if Daichi’s jacket. God, he loves this man.

Daichi kisses him on the nose and Suga melts in his arms. He opens his eyes again to look into Daichi’s and he finds infinite tenderness in his husband’s gaze. It almost makes him blush harder than the heat of their kiss.

“I didn’t stop you before, during the story,” Daichi says in a whisper, “I should have, it was already getting late but the thing is…you’ve never looked more beautiful than you did in that moment, with that baby in your arms.”

And these words are enough, the look in Daichi’s eyes is enough to spark a hope in Suga’s chest.

 

 

February 2032

 

Having waited so long to paint the baby’s room means that they have to shop for furniture and baby clothes and endless necessary baby things _fast_.

They visit every baby shop they know of to make sure they ‘’get the absolute best stuff’’ as Daichi puts it, and they have endless discussions between them – and with Daichi’s mother on the phone – about the best brand of diapers, the best type of stroller, the best fabrics to dress their son in.

_Their son._

Suga’s father drives all the way from Miyagi with his truck to deliver a special package and when Suga excitedly rips the wrapping paper through the sound of Daichi’s fond laughter and sees the present he almost tears up. It’s a rocking chair, similar to the one his father had made when Suga was born but even more beautiful. It’s of the same dark wood as the toy box and the feet are carved to look like branches. Vines entwine all around the armrests and the back is a triumph of leaves but for the headrest, which is plain so it’s not uncomfortable.

“Oh, dad…”

His father scratches the back of his head self-consciously and asks “Do you like it?”

Suga all but runs into his arms, eight years old again, and hugs him tight.

 

In the following weeks it’s hard for them to fall asleep. Even after hours and hours spent at work, once their heads hit the pillow thoughts of what’s about to happen assail them and suddenly they are more awake than ever.

“We are going to be parents.”

Daichi announces one night as he is reading through a lawsuit record. Suga puts his book down, it feels too heavy for his wrists to hold up, and looks at him.

“Yes,” he says as his heart speeds up.

Daichi turns to face him with eyes wide and spirited.

“We are going to have a son.”

“Yes.”

Suga’s mouth feels dry. Yes, in a couple of weeks – _or maybe less_ – there’s going to be a baby, and that baby is going to be 100% dependent on them. They are going to be responsible for another person’s life.

Suga starts laughing, loud and hysterical, so hard his abs hurt. Daichi stares at him dumbfounded for a minute and then joins in, just as loud, just as hysterical.

“What are we _thinking_?” Daichi wheezes after a while.

It sets them both off again.

 

Kaori doesn’t visit them quite as often but it doesn’t surprise either of them, she must be making her own preparations and besides, as big as she is now it’s not unexpected that she is not willing to move around quite as often.

They still call her daily, to ask her how she’s doing and whether she needs anything but the calls are often cut short, her roommate wants to ask her something, she needs to study for a test, she is tired and would like to take a nap.

Her text replies are short too and most of the time they come after hours. She has stopped using emojis. Suga worries, whenever he talks to her and hears her so distant he worries, then Daichi will ask him to help bring their new stroller up the stairs or something like that and Suga will push his uneasiness away to focus on reality, on the future.

 

There are only two weeks left to Kaori’s due date when she calls Suga on his phone during his shift. He’s performing a surgery then and when he receives a text for one missed call his heart makes a flip in his chest and he immediately calls Kaori back. She picks up on the second ring.

“Suga-san…”

“Kaori-chan, are you alright? It’s not time, is it?”

Kaori takes a deep breath and says “No, Suga-san. I only called to see if it was ok for me to come over tonight.”

She sounds weird, her voice is coming out clipped as if every word is a struggle for her to pronounce. Suga sits up straight in his chair as his stomach twists tightly in dread. She never once asked if it was ok for her to visit, she just came, knocked on their door with a bag of sweets or her schoolbag in her hand and let herself in.

This is weird, this is not…this is not good.

His voice shakes when he finally answers “Of course it’s ok, you don’t…you don’t need to ask.”

Kaori lets out what sounds suspiciously like a sob. “Alright, then. See y-you at six.”

She hangs up before Suga can reply. The line falls silent, dead, and Suga hides his face in his hands, tries to tell himself it’s not what he’s thinking. Tries to believe everything is going to be alright. He tries, but he doesn’t succeed.

 

He is scheduled to another surgery after and it goes well but because of some complications arising in the middle of it it lasts a little longer than expected. By the time he’s done talking with the kid’s parents and changing out of his scrubs, six have come and gone. He gets into a cab quick but when he gets home Kaori is already there.

She looks nervous and she has dark circles under her eyes, she hasn’t been sleeping well lately. She looks younger too, younger than her 21 years even, and Suga’s heart squeezes painfully in his chest.

_She is just a kid…_

Daichi lights up at the sight of him and greets him with a kiss. He is nervous too, on edge in front of Kaori’s uncharacteristically subdued behavior, but he doesn’t look particularly angry – or devastated, so Kaori mustn’t have told him anything yet.

A part of Suga still wants to believe that he read this all wrong, that Kaori already told Daichi what’s wrong and it’s not as bad as Suga thinks it is, _it’s_ _not_ what Suga thinks it is.

He wants to believe it, but he can’t.

Daichi hands him a cup of tea and they go sit at the kitchen table with Kaori. Suga puts a hand on Daichi’s thigh and squeezes gently, his thumb tracing the pattern of the slacks. A way to keep Daichi calm, to comfort him, or maybe just to ground himself. Suga is not sure. It doesn’t do any good tho, it just alarms Daichi more and he tenses under Suga’s touch.

Suga looks at Kaori and she avoids his eyes, focuses on the cup of tea in front of her. It’s full almost to the brim, she hasn’t drunk a single drop.

_Please just get it over with,_ he thinks to himself.

“Kaori…” he calls and she jumps as if instead of a whisper a yell had reached her ears.

_Please just say it. Shatter my heart so i can start picking up the pieces soon._

Kaori clears her throat and her lips move around the words she means to say, but no sound comes out. She tries again but this time the words become a sob. Her shoulders start to shake and then the tears start falling.

“I’m sorry, i’m so sorry.”

Daichi looks between her and Suga, confused and irritated and scared, and Suga closes his eyes for a moment, rights himself in his seat and says it, the thing he’s been dreading. For hours, for months.

“You are going to keep him.”

It’s not a question.

This time Kaori does look up, she has too much respect for them to hide away, that’s why she came here herself in the first place instead of just calling or sending someone else. She looks up and her eyes meet Suga’s. She nods, once, and that’s it.

And Suga had known it was coming, he had known but it still takes his breath away – that nod, that confirmation to his worst fear. His heart slows down, it beats in slow-motion, too heavy to keep its normal rhythm up. Suga feels so impossibly old all of a sudden, old and tired, as the weight of yet another disappointment – the heaviest, the most bitter disappointment – piles up on his weak, thin shoulders.

How is he going to fix himself after this. Where _the fuck_ is he supposed to find the strength?

“What do you mean?” Daichi’s voice resounds through the thick air between them, bounces on the walls and echoes in every corner of the house.

_Daichi…_

Suga turns to face him and his heart breaks anew at how lost Daichi looks in this moment. With his eyes he pleads Suga not to say anything more, as if not saying it could prevent it all from happening, from becoming true, and Suga wishes he could. More than anything he wishes he had the power to protect Daichi from this pain, he wishes he could take it all on himself so that Daichi wouldn’t be able to feel any of it.

But he doesn’t. “She is keeping the baby, Daichi,” he says again.

Daichi stares at him, at the way his lips move around the truth, at his eyes, still dry, at his hands, steady. Only for a moment and then he looks away, as if he can’t bear the sight of him. He stands up, the chair scratches the pavement, and when Suga tries to reach out he all but slaps his hand away.

“No, no. This can’t be.”

And then Kaori speaks. “Daichi-san i’m so sorr-”

“NO”

Daichi looks at her and under the heaviness of that stare, under the fury of it, Kaori seems to shrink. “Don’t you dare tell me this, don’t you dare tell me how sorry you are for doing th-” his voice breaks.

He lets out a sob, and then another, and he turns away from her, from both of them so all they can see is his trembling back.

Suga looks at him and he feels tears prickle under his eyes. But he can’t cry yet. He turns again to face Kaori. “You need to leave,” is all he says and she nods mutely.

He walks her to the door slowly, his legs are weak, too weak to support him and he feels impossibly heavy and incorporeal at the same time. He is not here and yet painfully aware ofhis own body, how it will not respond to his plea to stop shaking. He feels the pull of gravity, or maybe it’s a push, he feels everything. He feels nothing.

He wishes he knew where Daichi put his crutches, for now he leans on the wall for support.

Kaori is avoiding his eyes again and Suga wants to yell at her, like Daichi did, he wants to tell her that she has no right to feel sad, she has no right to cry because in two weeks she is going to have their baby – _her_ baby – and she’ll get to hold him, sing him to sleep, raise him. She’ll get to be a parent.

Suga wants to hate her, for promising them the happiness they can’t reach by themselves, but when he sees her standing by the door with her face wet from tears he finds that he can’t.

“I’ll call you a cab,” he offers, his voice flat. He doesn’t even recognize it.

“No i-it’s fine. I came with a friend, she is waiting for me in the car.”

“Smart move,” he comments, with more venom than he really feels.

She winces.

They share one last look, Suga searches his pocket and hands her a handkerchief then, without waiting for her to leave, he closes the door.

 

Daichi is in their bedroom, leaning heavily on the dresser, his hands closed into fists. He is still trembling from head to toe and when he hears Suga’s steps making their way to him he fixes Suga with a burning glare.

“How long have you known?”

Suga stops and the hands that were reaching out to hold Daichi close fall limply by his side. “What do you mean?”

“You already knew. When you got here, you already knew. So i’m asking, how long? For how long was i the only idiot here who didn’t have a clue, who thought everything was going fine, who thought that in two weeks we would…we would…”

He can’t say it – _we would have our baby_ – he can’t say it. But he can look at Suga with all the rage of the world in his eyes.

And Suga can’t breathe.

“Tell me how long,” Daichi asks again and his voice rises. “Just tell me.”

“I don’t know.”

It sounds weak even to his own ears but he doesn’t. Suga doesn’t know for how long he’s been doubting Kaori, he doesn’t know why it was so easy for him to understand the reason for her call, the reason for her tears. He doesn’t know why he couldn’t just yell at her to leave earlier, he doesn’t know why he still can’t hate her.

He doesn’t know anything, except that ‘i don’t know’ is not an answer Daichi can accept right now.

“Hours, maybe months,” he adds.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” there’s an edge of desperation to Daichi’s voice. He is trying to find an answer, any answer, to a situation that doesn’t really have any. But he is asking the wrong person.

Suga feels his temper rise. “What does it matter, Daichi? What does it matter now?” he hisses.

“I felt it, i felt that something was wrong _months_ ago. But i pushed it away because you know me, i overthink things all the time. And i thought that’s what it was. Me overthinking, getting cold feet, being my usual worrywart self.”

He laughs, but it feels wrong, as if it’s being forced out of his throat. But it’s funny, in a way, that the one time he was in his right to worry, the one time he was right, he didn’t listen to his instinct.

It’s funny but when Suga raises a hand to cover his laughing mouth he feels the dampness of tears on his palm.

“Koushi…”

Daichi touches his arm tentative, as if afraid Suga might push him away, and he is crying too now, sobs shake his chest, his entire body. And Suga hates this. He hates that he didn’t give importance to his worries, he hates that he never spoke to Daichi about them. Maybe if he had he could have spared him some of this pain.

Daichi falls into him and Suga holds him tight, holds him up when his legs give out. This, at least this, is something he can do.

 

Suga manages to walk them both to the bed and they lie there for hours, tho it feels more like days. Daichi falls asleep after a while, his head on Suga’s chest and endless trails of tears on his cheeks.

It’s close to midnight and Suga gently extricates himself from Daichi’s hold. He covers him with the blankets and kisses his temple, softly, not to wake him up. Then he makes his way to the baby’s room.

It’s all furnished, the orange drops on the floor from the paint battle Suga and Daichi had what feels like years ago seem to shine in the moonlight.

Suga takes his phone out of his pocket and sends a text to his father.

**Can you to take care of all the baby stuff when you come down next week?**

He takes a deep breathe and adds,

**We don’t need it anymore.**

His fingers are shaking so hard he almost drops the phone.

He makes his way to the rocking chair and sits. There, in front of the empty crib, he cries and cries, until there are no more tears for him to shed.

 

 

March 21st, 2033

 

The day starts quiet, almost lazy in the unexpected warmth of newly-spring air.

Suga is woken up by an insistent mouth leaving a burning, wet trail of kisses on his bare shoulder. He tries to ignore it, buries his face in the pillow and stubbornly squeezes his eyes shut as the sunlight peeking through the blinds colors his world fiery red.

_Just five more hours…_

Daichi sucks on the skin of Suga’s nape, right above a mole, and then gently nips at it. Suga can feel the heaviness of Daichi’s gaze on his face, ready to catch the minutest of his reactions, and bites the inside of his cheek to keep quiet. Schools his features in a relaxed expressions and feigns sleep.

But Daichi is set on this, he will not be ignored today. His hand moves under Suga’s thin shirt to tease a nipple and the simple graze of his calloused fingers is all it takes to make Suga gasp in surprise and pleasure. Daichi smirks against the crook of Suga’s neck, smug, and Suga curses him for playing the nipple card so soon. His telepathic message must get lost in translation because Daichi pinches his nipple again and again, each time with more purpose.

“You absolute – _ah_ – jerk,” Suga drawls in between whimpers.

Daichi doesn’t answer to the accusation, just noses at the crook of Suga’s neck and nibbles at his earlobe. He tugs at it gently then presses a kiss on the skin behind Suga’s ear. Suga shivers and throws his head back, in clear invitation. There’s really no use in playing hard to get now that a familiar heat is pooling low in his stomach and his fingers are curling around the sheets to grip them tight.

Daichi traces his pulse point with his tongue and Suga’s hips snap of their own accord to find some friction, to find Daichi’s. Daichi shudders, his hot breath tickling Suga’s hair, and Suga feels his erection press snugly against his backside.

It’s Suga’s turn to smirk.

“How long have you been like that?” he asks chirpily.

“Like what? Hard for you?”

Suga laughs and grinds his ass against Daichi’s crotch, hard enough to make him gasp, and Daichi’s hand grips at his waist, fingers digging in the flesh so hard they’re probably going to leave bruises. Suga hopes they will.

“You are cheesy even when you are trying to dirty-talk.”

Daichi huffs, offended, and covers Suga’s smiling mouth with his own. It’s a messy kiss, the angle weird and a little uncomfortable, not to mention their morning breath, but as soon as their tongues meet Suga melts into it. His hand reaches out behind him to tug at Daichi’s hair and Daichi moans low in his throat. Almost a growl.

Daichi’s hand glides down again, follows the hem of Suga’s shorts and stops, warm and sure, on Suga’s stomach to pull him even closer. Suga sighs, turns a little to look Daichi in the eyes…only to catch sight of the clock on the wall behind them.

“IT’S FRICKING 6 AM?!”

Daichi jumps at the pitch of his voice and Suga fixes him with a glare. “My shift starts at nine, Daichi. _Nine_. Why the hell did you wake me so early?”

Daichi wisely decides to stay silent and thumbs at Suga’s navel instead, gets back to worship the curves and plains of Suga’s body with his mouth and fingers.

“You’re not just a jerk, you’re a monster” Suga says, but his words are softened by the sighs that escape his lips.

 

The day starts quiet, but it doesn’t last. Suga should have known it couldn’t last.

 

He arrives at the hospital a little early. After Daichi had woken him up for a quickie - that didn’t really end up being so quick - he couldn’t seem to fall back asleep. He kept turning on the bed, the clock ticking on the wall making him feel more and more restless as each second passed.

So he gave up on sleep, got up and helped Daichi make breakfast. But once Daichi had left for work, with a lingering kiss and a murmured ‘see you later’ that sounded full of promises to Suga’s ears, there was nothing left for Suga to do. Hence arriving at the hospital almost an hour before his shift was meant to start.

And that revealed itself to be a very good idea.

Like the morning, his shift starts out quiet. He checks up on his patients, he adds another surgery to his week plan, respects his schedules. Parents and caretakers stop him to ask him more questions, or simply to chat. It’s as nice as a day spent in Peds can be.

Then he goes to see Ai –  the highlight of his working days, and more – and the smile gets ripped off his face. Her breathing is laboured, fatigued as it hasn’t been in weeks. Suga doesn’t pick her up, he doesn’t hold her in his arms like he wants to. Instead he takes the stethoscope out of his pocket and auscultates her heart and lungs.

She doesn’t kick like she usually does, bothered by the cold of the instrument, she doesn’t react at all and something that feels too much like dread cradles Suga’s heart in its palms and squeezes it viciously.

_No._

Hayakawa-san appears, breathing hard and clearly frenzied, just as his pager beeps.

“Suga-san,” she calls and Suga closes his eyes for a moment, as if this’ll stop the world from spinning. He recognizes that tone, it was one of the first things he learned during his training, how to tell when something has happened just by the color of a person’s voice.

He takes a deep breath and it comes out shaky, so he clears his throat and tries again. “What is it?” he asks.

Hayakawa-san puts a hand on his arm and says, “Car accident, sensei. Three children injured.”

Suga turns around to face her and he knows he should start running, the ER is on the other side of the hospital and he is needed there now, but _Ai_. He can’t just leave Ai alone.

He covers Hayakawa-san’s hand with his own and looks into her eyes pleadingly, begging her to believe him. “There’s something wrong with Ai-…with this baby. Please, _please_ call the chief and tell him.”

Hayakawa-san stares intensely at him for a moment, her gaze shifts from the worry in his eyes to the furrow of his brow, the nervous pinch of his lips, and Suga lets her look. He lets her read him like an open book because at this point he doesn’t give a shit what any of his colleagues might think of him. He just wants Ai to be safe.

_Please let her be safe._

Hayakawa-san finds it, whatever it is she was looking for, and she nods. She gives Suga’s hand a reassuring squeeze and then he’s gone.

 

The ER is pure chaos when Suga walks in. Four cars were involved in the accident and people keep calling each other’s names to make sure they’re alright. A couple of Suga’s brawnier colleagues are trying to lead an agitated man to a bed and there is a kid standing by himself, taking everything in with eyes wide as saucers and sporting a nasty cut on his cheek.

Suga walks to him and takes his hand to lead him away from the passageway, then another ambulance arrives and the kid hides his face in Suga’s chest at the sight in front of him. Suga can’t blame him, in days like this he wishes he could do the same.

 

Suga walks out of the operating room between the congratulations of the nurses. He thanks them all, but half-heartedly, and gives disposition to transfer the patient in one of the recovery rooms in the Pediatrics ward. There’s no one waiting for news outside. The child’s parents were both severely hurt in the accidents, they are probably on their way to surgery as well.

Still, no one should be alone at a time like this. Especially not a child.

Suga sighs and with a heavy weight on his chest he starts making his way to the neonatal ward to see Ai, but he’s stopped by a voice calling his name.

It’s the chief. He is leaning on the wall  right near the door to the operating room with his arms crossed over his ample chest. He’s been here the whole time and Suga hadn’t even noticed. Matsumoto-san regards him with a piercing look in his black eyes and gestures at the emergency stairs down the hallway. Suga follows nervously, but without complaints.

Matsumoto-san is a giant of a man, intimidating to strangers but kind to his patients and nearing his 60s he barely looks a day over 40. Suga may or may not have had a crush on him when he first started working here but now there is only endless mutual respect and an easy affection that reminds Suga of his relationship with his father. And it’s because of that respect and that affection that the chief decided to talk to him where he knew no one would hear.

Suga fiddles with his cap, his lucky cap with crows on it that Daichi had given him when he got his M.D. Uncertainty always makes him twitchy and not even when he was just a student terrified to mess up in front of his sensei, does Suga remember ever feeling so unsteady on his feet.

It’s about Ai. Suga can’t think of any other reason why the chief would want to see him alone and with so much urgency. It can only be about Ai.

Suga looks up, frantically studies Matsumoto-san’s face for a sign, a clue on how she is and there is a disquiet in the lines near his mouth, yes, but no sadness in his eyes, nothing that suggests something bad happened to her.

_Please tell me nothing happened to her._

They stop near the stairs and before Matsumoto-san can say anything Suga asks “Is she ok?”

It’s not what Matsumoto-san wanted to hear. His eyes narrow at the poorly-concealed fear in Suga’s voice, the way it shakes before breaking altogether echoes in the stillness of the stairwell. But Suga couldn’t have asked any other way, he can’t _feel_ any other way as his mind fills with images of her and his entire being itches with the need to hold her in his arms.

He just wants to know, he needs to know if she’s ok.

Matsumoto-san sighs and suddenly he looks twenty years older. He looks his age. “What are you doing, Koushi?”

What are you doing, getting attached to a patient like that? What are you doing, stopping after your shift is over just to spend time with her? What are you doing, telling her stories and stroking her hair and thinking about her even when she is not near?

These are the questions Matsumoto-san wants to ask but the answer Suga would give him – there is only one possible answer – is just another thing he doesn’t want to hear. So he stays vague, and Suga decides to play along.

“Right now? I’m asking you how she is.”

“That’s _not_ what i mean.”

Any other day the harshness in his voice would have made Suga jump, tense up in fear of a mistake but now, now that his fear has deeper roots, he just takes a step closer, and then another, until they’re standing almost nose to nose and they have nowhere else to look except into each other’s eyes.

 “How is she?” he asks again and this time it’s almost an order.

“She is fine, Sugawara-san. I auscultated her, it’s probably just a murmur.”

Suga’s blood starts to boil in his veins. This should reassure him, this should be the best possible news he could have gotten. He should smile and thank the chief, make his merry way to his daughter but he can’t. Because this is not right, this cannot be right. In the weeks she’s been here Suga has devoted his hours to learn, to commit to memory even the smallest things about her. The way she cries when she is hungry, the way she clings on him as she’s falling asleep, how she moves her tiny fists in protest when another baby wakes her up with their screams but doesn’t join in unless she wants something too.

He’s heard her heart beat in time with his own, he’s felt her breathing with her face nestled sweetly in the crook of his neck. He knows his daughter, he _knows_ her.

“It’s not a murmur, it can’t be.”

Matsumoto-san’s jaw twitches. His patience is starting to wear thin. “Sugawara-san, with all due respect i did as you asked, i checked on your _patient_ while you were busy and i found nothing of relevance…”

“Then look harder,” Suga hisses.

And instead of firing him Matsumoto-san decides to trust him. For whatever reason he decides to trust Suga’s judgement, even if he knows full well that Suga is far from lucid, far from the detached professional his job needs him to be.

 

They are on their way to the neonatal ward when both their pagers beep. Suga curses, thinking of yet another emergency that’ll take him away from Ai, looks down to read the message and his heart stutters.

He starts running.

 

Hayakawa-san is waiting for them outside the nursery. Suga makes to go in but she stops him with a hand on his chest and blocks his way.

“The baby…” is all she tells the chief.

Matsumoto-san steps inside swiflty and curses. “Page Okada-san immediately, and all the nurses available in the ward.”

Okada-san, the other pediatric surgeon in the hospital.

“What’s happening?” Suga asks, he wants to ask but all that comes out of his lips is a sob.

He makes to move around Hayakawa-san but she wraps her arms around him to keep him in place. He tries to push her away, he tries but his body won’t respond, it doesn’t feel his own. He tells it to walk and nothing happens. His sane knee gives out. His prosthetis seems to weigh a ton. He is a marionette with its strings cut.

“You don’t need to see this, Suga-san,” Hayakawa-san says, her voice firm as her grip.

_Of course i do_ , he wants to tell her. _That’s my daughter_. He wants to scream it.

_That’s my daughter._

 

They don’t let him inside the operating room. Hayakawa-san cups his face right before going in and promises she’ll come out to update him every 30 minutes. Not every hour, but every 30 minutes. If Suga were able to do anything but shiver he’d thank her for showing so much kindness.

He sits heavily on the seats of the waiting room and now that he is alone and still panic takes over. Ai is far away, just on the other side of that white door but Suga cannot reach her. His body is running cold and it’s like the sun went out, gave up on shining on him.

He takes a deep breath, collects the last of his coherence and calls Daichi.

 

_A mild lung collapse._

Suga hides his face in his hands, nails digging in the skin of his cheeks hard. He doesn’t feel any pain, not over this.

_Okada-san decided to intervene surgically._

A sob slips past his lips and shakes his chest, his entire body.

He should have come to her sooner this morning. She should have been his priority, this morning like every morning. He shouldn’t have put his patients first. But she had been getting better, she was fine, and most of his patients…they weren’t as stable.

But she is not fine either. Not anymore.

Tears pour out of his eyes uninvited. He tries to keep them in, he dries his face with the sleeve of his scrub top but they overflow and he can’t stop them. They fall down his trembling fingers, pool in his helpless palms and then crawl, chase each other down Suga’s wrists and crash on the linoleum floor with senseless grace. Maybe as they escaped from him his tears were hoping to find fertile soil, to become part of something and be born anew.

They find nothing here, nowhere to go, and they stay still at Suga’s feet, catching the cold light of the neons.

A warm hand comes rest on Suga’s shoulder and he sighs in relief. The last tears fall and then his eyes are dry.

 

Daichi is out of breath and pretty much lets himself fall on the chair next to Suga. The lines around his eyes and between his brows are deep and he looks scared, terrified when he notices the half-moon shaped nail marks on Suga’s cheeks. As Suga explains what’s wrong with Ai his apprehension only seems to grow.

They don’t hold each other, neither of them could bear it, but Daichi’s hands find Suga’s still trembling on his lap and they lace their fingers together.

“So what…what happens now?” Daichi asks.

There is no answer to that question. Suga could explain to him in details what a VATS implies, he could recite statistic after statistic on the chances Ai has to recover fully but this isn’t what Daichi wants to know. Not really.

Suga meets his eyes and attempts a smile. It’s feeble and a little crooked but it’s all he can manage right now. “Now we are there for her.”

Daichi nods and brings Suga’s hands to his lips.

 

Hayakawa-san keeps her promise. Every thirty minutes she is there for them, to tell them everything she knows and answer all their questions. Her grin when she walks out at surgery over is going to stay with Suga for the rest of his life.

She hugs them both tight and they cling to her, with the heartbreaking, desperate enthusiasm that takes possession of people who have escaped a tragedy together.

 

Ai looks so tiny surrounded by all these machines.

Daichi and Suga walk in the neonatal intensive care unit hand in hand and as soon as Suga’s eyes fall on her he finally feels like he can breathe. She is back in an incubator and she has a bandage all around her torso but she is here, she is here with them.

Suga sits by her side and just looks for a moment, takes in everything, everything he hasn’t lost and this time his smile is real, so wide his cheeks are already starting to hurt.

“Ai-chan,” he whispers. He means to say more, but the words won’t come so he just opens one of the holes of the incubator and holds her hand. Even in her sleep she closes her fingers around his pinky and squeezes it tight. Like that first day, when she came into his life.

“Ai…” Daichi echoes and he is watching them with infinite tenderness in his eyes. “Written as ‘love’ or ‘indigo’?”

He phrases it like a question but it’s clear he already knows the answer. Suga blushes a little, embarrassed by his own openness and clarity, and pats on the chair beside him.

Daichi comes to sit too and suddenly the air around them thickens with all the things Suga wants to say. They are thousands between explanations and requests, pleads and apologies, but one in particular sits heavy in his throat. That which he can’t leave unsaid. He breathes in heavily and lets the words come out with his exhale. “She is my daughter, Daichi. _Our_ daughter.”

And it’d be selfish, rude of him to speak for Daichi this way if he weren’t so damn _sure_.

Daichi strokes his cheek with the back of his hand and simply says “I know.”

It’s enough. It’s everything.

 

 

May 11th, 2034

 

The sun has made a timid return in their sky today after weeks of threatening clouds and vicious thunderstorms. As soon as Suga had felt the warmth of its rays this morning he’d woken Ai up with loud, smacking kisses and dressed her to go to the park.

And he hadn’t been the only one who thought it’d be best to take advantage of this small blessing because the entire city seems to be here. At the sight of so many people Ai lets out an excited squeal and starts fidgeting in Suga’s arms.

She just started taking her first tentative steps a couple of weeks ago and now she thinks herself more than ready to run the marathon at the next Olympics. Which is wonderful of course, every progress, every discovery she makes is wonderful but this particular development means that every time they go out she refuses to sit on the stroller, dead set on walking side by side hand in hand with her daddies. But naturally she gets tired after a few minutes and she has to be picked up because, again, the stroller has become The Enemy.

On days when they are all together none of this is an issue, the one who doesn’t have a armful of toddler pushes the stroller. Easy as pie. But today it’s just Suga and Ai and Suga, to put it mildly, is struggling.

He’s just braved it through the little koi pond to reach the area of the park where there is the small playground Ai likes best when a boy bumps into them and makes Suga’s bag fall to the ground.

Suga is about to blurt out an extremely vulgar curse then he meets Ai’s wide, innocent eyes and bites his lip quick. Gods save him from Daichi’s ire if Ai learns a bad word because of him.

“Papa, move!”

Suga snorts and pats her on the bottom. “Papa is trying, Shrimpy. Papa is trying.”

He is just about to see if he can reach the bag without bending his knees when a gentle voice says “Let me,” and picks it up for him.

He turns to thank his savior but the smile, along with his words, freezes on his lips.

It’s Kaori.

 “Sugawara-san…” is all she says and her cheeks color when her voice breaks. She is looking at him as if he were a ghost, her mouth slack with shock and eyes wide. Suga doubts he’s doing any better at hiding his surprise so he tries to school his expression into something more poised and collected and reaches out to take his bag.

Kaori starts for a moment then hands him the bag timidly. It’s then that Suga notices how hard she is shaking and his heart gives a painful squeeze at the sight.

He hoists the bag on his shoulder and gives her a quick nod. “Thank you Kaori-san.”

Kaori shakes her head, so forcefully her long hair moves with her and comes to fall in her eyes. It’s a good excuse for her not to look at him.

“Papa!” Ai cries out, loud enough to make Suga and Kaori both jump.

“Yes, yes we are going,” Suga chides her, “but i’ve already told you not to yell.”

Ai pouts at him, not really understanding what he’s saying but recognizing his tone, and rests her head on his shoulder, sweet as cotton candy again. She is giving him the puppy eyes too and Suga feels his insides melt and his chest swell with pride. She has mastered his art so well, and it’s even easier now to give Daichi a hard time and make him do whatever they want.

He turns his face down a little and presses a gentle kiss on her forehead, then one of her nose. She starts giggling in the crook of his neck and he blows a raspberry on her cheek.

Between his daughter’s squeals of joy he almost misses Kaori’s sigh. Almost. He looks at her again, and he is about to apologize for ignoring her but she shakes her head again and smiles. It’s merely the ghost of the bright beam she used to give him and Daichi what now feels like eons ago but it’s sincere.

“I’m very happy for you, Sugawara-san.”

She makes to turn around, quick to fade away as that smile but Suga calls her name one more time – one last time – and waits for her to meet his eyes. When she finally does he says “Take care, _Kaori_.”

He hopes she understands how much he means it.

They wave at each other and Ai waves too.

Suga and Ai resume their journey to the playground and Ai squeals in delight as soon as she catches sight of a familiar silhouette waiting near the swings.

“Daddy! Daddy! Papa, Daddy!” she tells Suga, eagerly pointing at Daichi, who is now waving at them so flashingly he looks like a man lost at sea calling for a ship to rescue him.

Suga smiles and puts Ai down. “What do you say we show daddy our skills, Ai-chan?

And they walk hand in hand down the sunlit path.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy birthday dearest Carole, i hope you like my present!
> 
> A couple of notes:  
> \- VATS is a surgical procedure where a video camera is inserted in the patient's chest thanks to a scope. I'm not a medical student or any of the likes so while i tried my best to do my research if you see any medical-related bullshit i'm really, really sorry.  
> \- Ai can mean either love/affection (愛) or indigo (藍), depending on how it's written.  
> \- This can be read as some sort of sequel to my other fic [belongs to gravity](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5687653) but you don't have to read that first or anything.  
> \- Matsumoto-san in my head looks a lot like Jessica Jones' Luke Cage, i case you were curious about him.  
> \- There was an extra scene set after Daichi and Suga decide to adopt Ai that i chose not to include because it didn't flow well but here's a fragment:  
> “That rocking chair you made for us…you don’t happen to still have it, right?”  
> His father laughs, elated. “Of course i do. Do you want the rest of your baby stuff too?”
> 
>  
> 
> Also I have a [Twitter](https://twitter.com/JKNo_emi)


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